


Strange Ghosts

by orphan_account



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Ghosts, Haunting, M/M, Post-Reichenbach, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-24
Updated: 2013-12-24
Packaged: 2018-01-05 22:35:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1099373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock falls. John waits.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Strange Ghosts

**Author's Note:**

  * For [strangelock](https://archiveofourown.org/users/strangelock/gifts).



> A Christmas pressie: ghostlock for strangelock, with love. <3
> 
> **Please note that I have chosen not to use archive warnings. If you have ANY questions about content, please feel free to email me at thejudasboogie at gmail; I would be happy to help you decide if this piece would be a good fit for you. Thank you.

Sherlock is dead, and John has the worst headache of his life.

Mid-June and London brings what brightness it will, unfurls into summer. John stays in the flat. Would feel he was taking a holiday, if he left, so: bare feet. Plaid armchair. Windows he once shivered before, saw repaired.

_If I wait,_ he thinks. _If I’m here when you come home._

Sherlock fell. John saw. Still sees: blood on pavement, alarmed blue eyes, a gathered crowd.

Sherlock isn’t coming home.

John waits, anyway.

*

John’s headache fades.

He sits through countless cups of tea with Mrs. Hudson. Lets her talk herself hoarse, drink his tea stocks down. She seems so angry with Sherlock: _how could he, so much to ask, surely there must have been another way…_

Other times, she shakes her head. Covers her mouth. Whispers, _Sherlock, you poor man. You poor, poor man._

*

Sherlock’s things vanish one by one. 

Flasks, microscope, skull: gone without explanation. What remains moves as though of its own accord. The violin case appears in the middle of the bedroom floor; a glass smudged with fingerprints materialises on the desk; the Bond DVDs scatter across the coffee table. John’s not sharp, anymore, is maybe moving them, forgetting, but... 

_Haunting me,_ John thinks. _Bastard._

_Don’t go._

Sometimes, at night, John hears--well. 

No. 

Sherlock never cried.

*

August muggy over London and John drifts on the sofa. Hears someone shuffle up the steps: Mrs. Hudson, probably, come to have a chat. John sits, palms sleep from his eyes. 

Sherlock stops dead in the doorway. 

Curls cropped close, forehead beaded with sweat, beard wild, body slouched under a tee shirt: he looks older. Exhausted.

Wary.

“You don’t have to talk,” John says, slow. Afraid Sherlock will fade at the sound. Then, when he doesn’t: “I didn’t think you’d look so real.”

Sherlock blinks, his face as wounded-scared as it was by a Dartmoor fire. Sits on the sofa and whispers, “Mrs. Hudson told me you were here, but I couldn’t…” Sherlock swallows. “John. I’m so sorry. I’m so--”

Folding into himself, Sherlock--not a ghost, but a living, breathing being, frightened in John’s living room--sobs into his hands.

“Hey,” says John, shifting close. “Sherlock. It doesn’t--shh. It’s all right.”

Sherlock whimpers when John holds him. Leans. Breathes, “I didn’t think I would miss you so much.”

“Thanks, I think.” John feathers fingers through Sherlock’s hair. “Is he dead? Moriarty?”

“Yes, and his second. Moran. Mycroft’s seeing to the loose ends. But...” Sherlock’s eyes are red-rimmed. “You don’t remember.” 

John frowns. “Remember what?”

The tenderness of Sherlock’s hand on John’s cheek is nearly unbearable. “There was a cyclist.”

*

They share an age of silence. 

“A--I don’t understand.”

There’s dizzying guilt in Sherlock’s eyes; John can hardly see Sherlock in this tired, solicitous stranger. “Moriarty’s people had to believe that I was dead, John, or they would have come after you, and Lestrade, and Mrs. Hudson. I planned every last detail... it was imperative that you not see me hit the life net, so I arranged for a cyclist to knock you down. Moriarty must have found out, because the cyclist did as I asked, but his brakes had been cut. He couldn’t… he was doing about 24 when he hit you. You fell, and you hit your head. Hard.”

There is only, through the windows, the murmur of tyres on hot pavement.

“I remember blood.” Sherlock’s lips part, but before he speaks, John understands: “It was mine. I’m… I’m not alive.”

“No,” Sherlock says, so soft.

John nods. Tries to remember the last time he left the flat. Drank a mug of tea. Took a bath.

Can’t.

“I moved my things into 221C,” Sherlock continues. “221B was--I couldn’t--Mrs. Hudson told me about you, but I never once saw…” 

“Move back in.” Sherlock startles; John gentles the back of his neck. “Please.”

The sofa creaks as Sherlock lies down. Rests his head in John’s lap. Nods.

Clings.

**Author's Note:**

> Why yes, these *are* three 221Cs. (Word count from Google Docs, so AO3 may not agree...)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Cover for Strange Ghosts](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1124165) by [strangelock](https://archiveofourown.org/users/strangelock/pseuds/strangelock)




End file.
